Yes! he might do that; so when he had got to the top, he saw a light
shining from the north. So he ran down and told his mother.

'We must get on, mother; we are near a house, for I see a bright
light shining quite close to us in the north.' Then she rose and
shouldered her bag, and set off to see; but they hadn't gone far,
before there stood a steep spur of the hill, right across their path.

'Just as I thought!' said the old dame; 'now we can't go a step
farther; a pretty bed we shall have here!'

But the lad took the bag under one arm, and his mother under the
other, and ran straight up the steep crag with them.

'Now, don't you see! don't you see that we are close to a house!
don't you see the bright light?'

But the old dame said those were no Christian folk, but Trolls, for
she was at home in all that forest far and near, and knew there was
not a living soul in it, until you were well over the ridge, and had
come down on the other side. But they went on, and in a little while
they came to a great house which was all painted red.

'What's the good?' said the old dame, 'we daren't go in, for here the
Trolls live.'

'Don't say so; we must go in. There must be men where the lights
shine so', said the lad. So in he went, and his mother after him, but
he had scarce opened the door before she swooned away, for there she